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Bosworth was born on January 2, 1983, in Los Angeles, California.[2] She is the only child of Patricia (née Potter), a homemaker, and Harold Bosworth, a former executive for Talbots.[3][4] At the age of six, Bosworth's family relocated from San Francisco to various parts of the country due to her father's job.[3] She was raised mainly on the East Coast, spending the rest of her youth in Massachusetts and Connecticut.[3]

Bosworth has always been interested in a professional career as a competitive horse racer and, by the age of fourteen, she was a champion equestrian.[3][5] She graduated from Cohasset High School, in Cohasset, Massachusetts, in 2001.[6][7]

Bosworth's first film role came after an open casting call in New York for the supporting part of Judith in the 1998 film, The Horse Whisperer. The film's producers needed someone who was already an experienced horse rider, leading to Bosworth's successful audition for the role.[5] The film received positive reception from film critics.[9] In 2000, she starred in the television series drama Young Americans, in which she played Bella Banks.[10] The series, however, was canceled.[8] That same year, she had a small part in the film Remember the Titans.[10] In 2001, Bosworth moved to Los Angeles in hopes of obtaining easier access to auditions and better film parts.[3]

The breakthrough role in Bosworth's career came in the 2002 surfing movie Blue Crush, which she prepared for by working out with two separate trainers seven hours a day for months in order to add fifteen pounds of muscle to her frame.[11] In his review of the film, Rolling Stone's Peter Travers wrote: "Bosworth is a star in the making, but even she can't outshine the surfing footage, which is flat-out spectacular."[12] The film received positive reviews[13][14] and grossed $40 million at the United States box office.[15] Following the success of Blue Crush, Bosworth took on roles in the indie films The Rules of Attraction (2002), and a darker turn in Wonderland (2003) opposite Val Kilmer, where she played the teenage girlfriend of porn star John Holmes.[10][16]

Bosworth was cast as reporter Lois Lane in Bryan Singer's superhero film Superman Returns (2006).[28] She starred along with her Beyond the Sea co-star Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor, as well as newcomer Brandon Routh as Superman.[29][30] The film was a box office success and received mostly positive reviews.[31] Bosworth's performance however, was not well received among critics; Anthony Lane of The New Yorker noted, "The new Lois Lane, Kate Bosworth, is not a patch on Margot Kidder, or, for that matter, on Teri Hatcher, in the TV series."[32]San Francisco Chronicle film critic Mick LaSalle felt that Bosworth, at 22-years-old, was too young to portray Lois Lane, and the climax did not "match the potential of the tiring 154 minute long film".[33] Although Bosworth's performance was ambivalently received, she herself loved the experience of working on the movie. As she told Teen Vogue in August 2006, "You know how you have an experience, a time in your life when you feel you've come into your own? When you grow up a bit, and think, Now I get it? [...] That's how I feel. I feel a little bit more complete."[34] The movie grossed $52 million during its opening weekend in North America and went on to earn $391 million worldwide.[35]

Her next film is the epic The Warrior's Way, which she shot in New Zealand alongside Korean star Jang Dong-gun and Geoffrey Rush.[42][43] She has also optioned the film rights to Catherine Hanrahan's novel Lost Girls and Love Hotels. She will produce the project alongside filmmaker Nadia Connors.[44] She has said about her roles, "I just don't do comfort zones."[45] In January 2008, Bosworth was named the new face for Calvin Klein Jeans and will be featured in the Calvin Klein Jeans campaign.[46] She also takes on the role of spokesperson for American luxury bag brand Coach in Asia.[47]

In 2011, Bosworth made her singing debut in a Cotton Incorporated's "Fabric of My Life" advertisement.[48] On 4 December 2012, Topshop revealed that Bosworth was the "secret" women in the new Topshop Christmas Adverts.[49]

Bosworth designed a jewelry line with friend and celebrity stylist Cher Coulter called JewelMint, which launched in October 2010.[50] JewelMint, the first vertical of MySpace co-founder Josh Berman[51] and Diego Berdakin’s social commerce company, BeachMint, has designs by Coulter and Bosworth.[52]

Bosworth released ten films between 2011 and 2014, moving away from the big-budget Superman franchise into critically acclaimed films like Still Alice with Julianne Moore. The short film Lov, which was filmed in Slovenia, featured Bosworth and launched fashion designer Vanessa Bruno’s Fall 2011 campaign.[53]

In July 2011, Bosworth broke up with her boyfriend, Swedish actor Alexander Skarsgard, after two years of dating. In mid-2011, Bosworth began dating American director Michael Polish, whom she had met earlier that year when he directed her in the film Big Sur.[56] Bosworth and Polish announced their engagement in August 2012,[57] and married on August 31, 2013 in Philipsburg, Montana.[58]